Silicone compounds, unlike their fatty counterparts, have a uniquely lower surface tension. The ability to lower surface tension results in many interesting attributes of silicones in formulation. The slow addition of behenyl dimethicone into soybean oil results in a decrease in surface tension, and formation of micelles at concentration over the CMC of the soybean oil in a way that is directly analogous to the reduction of the surface tension seen in Figure 1. Figure 3 shows the effect. The structure of the specific alkyl silicone added to the soybean oil will determine the amount of alkyl silicone that is required to lower the surface tension to a given value. In other words, the efficiency of the alkyl silicone in lowering the surface tension of the oil is not the same for all alkyl silicones, and not the same for alkyl silicones having the same INCI name. The INCI name not only does not reveal the type of alkyl group present, but not the percentage of alkyl group relative to silicone present, nor does it reveal the size of the molecule. The concept of RF504 has been proposed as a way to determine the effectiveness of alkyl silicone compounds in lowering the surface tension of oils. Evaluating the effect of concentration of surfactant upon surface tension when more than one type of surfactant is present is important to the formulator since these so-called mixed systems are what is present in a formulation. In order to quantify the effect of adding silicone surfactant to fatty surfactant the following procedure was followed: To a 1% solution of the fatty surfactant was added different amounts of silicone surfactant and the surface tension was measured and plotted. This approach allows one to study the effect of adding silicone surfactant to fatty surfactant to observe interactions and synergies. Since all cosmetic formulations contain more than water and silicone surfactant, the interaction of the silicone with the formulation is critical to formulation.